


a Rescue, of a sort

by CopperCaravan



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, F/M, Fenera Mahariel, Pre-Relationship, Rescue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-29
Updated: 2016-04-29
Packaged: 2018-06-05 04:22:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6688978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CopperCaravan/pseuds/CopperCaravan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A fairy tale AU that nobody needed: Nathaniel is rescued from a tower.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a Rescue, of a sort

**Author's Note:**

> If you ever find yourself held captive in the highest room of the tallest tower, don't hold your breath for Mahariel & Co. because they're sorry excuses for knights.

When Nathaniel turns around to pick up another book, he’s met with a very peculiar sight: there’s an elf in his window. Well, there’s _half_ an elf in his window. One of her legs is thrown over the sill and she’s holding herself up with one arm. Her other half is still outside, scaling the wall.

He hadn’t been expecting an elf but he supposes she’ll do.

“Are you here to rescue me?”

“Am I here to—” She only squints at him—as though it isn’t a perfectly reasonable question—and looks down below. “You blasted idiots,” she calls. “You didn’t tell me there was some... some _noble arse_ holed up in this tower.”

Well. That’s quite rude.

“It isn’t my fault,” comes a voice. “I didn’t know.”

“And I didn’t want to come,” calls another, this one a bit gruffer.

The elf huffs and swings her other leg over, taking a step into his room and looking around as though appraising the space. “Do you _live_ here?”

He’d thought that fairly obvious. Before he can answer, however, there’s another person coming through the window, this one a tall, blonde man who clumsily bangs his head on the wall with a curse. And then, with even less elegance, comes a dwarf who is, so far as Nathaniel can tell, far more beard than body.

The dwarf slumps into a chair, muttering all the while about “sodding towers and the sodding void,” and the man begins picking immediately through Nathaniel’s carefully curated bookcase without care. The elf, still, is simply standing in the middle of the room, taking up far more space than it seems she should be able, and staring at everything. Everything except Nathaniel himself.

It has become rather apparent that she is _not_ here to rescue him. But an opportunity is an opportunity.

“Who... are you, exactly, my lady?”

She waves him away. “I’m not your lady, for one thing, shem.”

The man in the corner—and it has _not_ escaped Nathaniel’s notice that he’s been stuffing books into his bag—chuckles and, without looking up from the book in his hand, says “Oh, I don’t know, Mahariel. He’s not that ugly.”

These people—they’re all quite rude. These are not the noble knights, the heroic rescue, he was expecting. Maker’s sake, the dwarf has started drinking some strong-smelling concoction from a flask hidden under his beard!

Nathaniel takes a breath and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Mahariel, then. This is your name, Ser?”

“Ser?” She grins and turns to her companions, flinging her hands into the air. “Did you hear that, boys? I’m a _Ser_ now. A proper knight. I can’t wait to tell the Queen!”

“I’ll bet,” the man returns dryly.

Nathaniel clears his throat, finally beginning to lose his patience. “If you are not here to rescue me, and if you are not declaring a Lord’s colours, then would you kindly tell me _who you are_?”

“We’re Wardens, then,” she says, dropping onto his desk with a _thump_ and crossing one leg over the other _._ “You’ve heard of the Wardens, haven’t you?”

He has. Not Knights, perhaps, but still. A worthy cause, certainly the sort of cause that would justify his leaving this stuffy tower. “And you would take me with you?”

She eyes him, cocks an eyebrow and leans back a bit to rifle through a drawer. He coughs, uncomfortable under her scrutiny.

“What are you even _doing_ up here?” she asks, her eyes still on him and her fingers still digging through his desk. “Didn’t run into any fire-breathing dragons guarding the place.”

“Well, no, I’m afraid it isn’t so simple as that.”

She snorts. “Simple? I dunno how many dragons _you’ve_ killed, oh Prince, but I’m three for three and ‘simple’ isn’t the word I’d use.” He doesn’t answer and she looks him up and down twice. “There anything interesting in this tower besides you?”

“Afraid not,” he says, unable to conceal a smirk.

She hops off the desk and heads to the window, waving her companions along behind her, muttering about wasted effort and treasure. Nathaniel feels his pulse quicken; he’ll be left here. Again.

The dwarf is out the window first, grunting and cursing as he descends the wall, and the man—his bag shamelessly full of Nathaniel’s books—follows close behind.

The elf rolls her eyes. “Well are you coming or not, Princey?”

_Oh._

Well, this will be... interesting.


End file.
